1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a data processing apparatus with records comprising a plurality of fields, more particularly, it relates to a data processing apparatus which displays a card image and field data and processes the displayed data, and a field defining method used therein.
2. Description of Related Art
A conventional card image data processing apparatus is disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 59-68040 (1984). In the conventional apparatus, when fields in a card image is defined, there has been a problem that it is difficult to visually grasp a field display area. And, when the fields are defined by appointing the field display area and the types of field such as a numeric type, character type and the like, there has also been a problem that various keys are required for appointing the display area for every different type of field, which results in a poor operability of appointing the display area.
Furthermore, in the conventional apparatus, not only a predetermined appointing mark should be inputted to define the field area, the field character size definition was performed by an operation separate from display area appointment by the appointing mark, or the character size could not be changed as it is fixed.
In the card image data processing, since the field definition is usually repeated in the direction of a line or column, the operation of field definition is inefficient if it is repeated on each line or column. The repetitive defined contents also can be preferably displayed clearly to the operator.